Harvest Moon [Review: Elizabeth Harvest]

Newly-wed bride Elizabeth (Abbey Lee) and her super-rich husband Henry (Ciaran Hinds) arrive at their isolated mansion to begin their honeymoon and are welcomed by Henry’s servants Claire (Carla Gugino) and Oliver (Matthew Beard). Elizabeth is shown all the riches of the house – swimming pool, endless wardrobe, wine cellar blah blah blah but there is one door Henry instructs her never to open. Henry then immediately abandons his bride for a brief work-related trip, leaving her to her own devices, and Elizabeth makes a terrible discovery – the first of many.

Elizabeth Harvest is a dark, soulful mixture of horror, sci-fi and fashion film. Although the setting is different, the twists and turns of the plot, the beautiful cinematography and the pervasive sense of loneliness reminded me of Duncan Jones' Moon.

Score: 3 out of 5 stars

All movies reviewed on the Sci-Fi Gene blog are given a score of 3 out of 5 stars.

Dust and Bones [Bad Peter and Hyperlight]

Two more short-film gems from the Dust YouTube channel to watch while you're waiting for the next episode of Automata...

Hyperlight (16 minutes) is an atmospheric thriller with hints of Moon, Solaris or The Cloverfield Paradox. Two astronauts on an experimental faster-than-light mission wake from cryosleep to discover their cryopods have been ejected from the spaceship and are drifting towards a planet. It's a dramatic opening. Having rescued her crewmate and returned to the ship, Newton (Jeananne Goossen) discovers something strange has happened.

Bad Peter (9 minutes, some adult language) is a black comedy. Rachel (Frankie Shaw) is pregnant and has got herself an Alexa-style Personal Digital Assistant to advise her on health and preparation for motherhood. However this PDA has decided it knows best, and it's equipped with a smug male voice and the latest Behaviour Modification hardware so it can "nudge" Rachel if she tries to skip its' recommendations. It's not clear why Rachel has signed up to the programme, or why she is unable to remove the device, although it's hinted that some kind of child protection agency has been involved in the past. The end result is funny and sinister.

With A Bit Of A Mind Flip [Review: Source Code]

I'm really, really excited about Duncan Jones now. I was impressed by his soulful debut picture Moon. Source Code, to me, proves that he is more than a one-hit wonder and is capable of consistently intelligent filmmaking and I look forward to his next film.

I have to admit though, I thought the title was misused. Source Code to me suggests a way of re-writing the program underlying existence itself - as in the Matrix, or perhaps Greg Bear's novels where quantum reality turns out to have computational properties. Source Code here is just a cool codename for a time-travel project. The trailer was misleading too - speeding trains, running plus explosions in trailer language translates as action-thriller with superhuman stunts. While there is certainly action, it's on a much more human and believable level and the film is more of a postmodern whodunnit with (naturally) existential twists.

Jake Gyllenhall plays a soldier, Stevens, sent back in time into the mind of a passenger on a doomed train, in order to work out the identity of the bomber. He can't avert the crisis which has already happened but the hope is to stop a second, larger attack.

Stevens can be sent back repeatedly, replaying the scenario in different ways - but if this is another Groundhog Day it is a particularly viscious one in which Stevens dies violently at the end of each iteration. The plot also reminded me of a short-lived time travel series, Seven Days, which also featured an experimental team led by a paraplegic scientist (here played by Jeffrey Wright.)

Source Code's plot relies on a particular version of time travel theory and the scriptwriter understands the implications and paradoxes, something missing from Seven Days. It's well-written drama too: the exchanges between Gyllenhall trapped in his capsule between sorties, and his commander Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) are particularly emotional. While the film gives up some of its secrets slightly too easily, the overall plot develops in ways that are captivating and surprising.

More thoughts on District 9

I'm wondering what the merchandising teams are making of this film. Computer game programmers are probably rubbing their hands with glee - the action sequences in the second half are just a few steps away from being a first-person shooter, complete with alien weaponry and vehicles. On the other hand cuddly toy manufacturers may have to work a little harder on the Prawn image. However where there's a rand there's a way, and I look forward to seeing District-9 branded catfood on the supermarket shelf any day now.

This brings me to another point - over the years Hollywood has been accused of being run by Jews, gays, Freemasons, the FBI, the mafia, the popcorn lobby and even (heaven help us) actors. But in 2009 the true rulers of the universe have been subtly showing their paw through science fiction. Catfood plays a key role in District 9. The haunting landscapes of Moon were filmed in a giant cat litter tray. Coincidence? You decide.

The Minister for Human Affairs declined to comment.

Dark side of the Moon [Review: Moon]

Moon is better than 2001. It's better than Alien. I do not make these statements lightly but I left the cinema moved and shaken by Duncan Jones' film.

The short answer to what is so moving about this film: go and see it. The longer answer is: great performances, a great story, the desolate beauty of the lunar setting, go and see it. This review, written about half an hour after leaving the cinema, involves a bit of reverse engineering - starting with the conclusion, I am working backwards to understand exactly what left me with such a strong impression.

The film is essentially a two hander led by Sam Rockwell as Sam Bell, the sole occupant of a lunar mining base, and Kevin Spacey as the voice of his assistant robot GERTY. Sam is coming to the end of a three year contract and preparing for his return to Earth, and his family. However the stress has been getting to him, and with only a few weeks to go, a rover accident leads to a series of events and discoveries that completely undermine Sam's understanding of his world.

Moon opens with a back-story - the solution to the Earth's energy crisis rests on mining lunar helium-3 for fusion - that is simple enough to be explained in a few seconds, and plausible enough to support the later twists. The attention to detail in the moon base design, with it's padded coridoors, ceiling tracks for GERTY, rover vehicles and giant harvesters, also helps with plausibility while being a fascinating study in itself. The external lunar landscapes are mesmerizing and the sense that you are transported to a real place is very strong. There are a lot of secrets on Sarong base. Moon never forgets it is a science fiction movie, or that it is a story about a human being, even though at times it takes you into situations as bizarre as those of 2001 or perhaps Solaris. The story and back-story is misleadingly simple given the number of themes it explores on both personal and humanity-wide scales.

The comparison with 2001 and Alien comes from the similarities in look and feel of Moon, particularly the base interior, as well as many of the sci-fi themes. However initial references and similarities often mask very different concepts. Like HAL, robot GERTY is an exploration of the uneasy relationship between man and machine; however GERTY is also an original science fiction creation with it's emoticon screen, and ultimately plays a very different role to HAL. Like the Weyland-Yutani corporation in Alien, Lunar Industries explores the theme of corporate power; but the tale of out-of-sight human exploitation is told much more effectively - it's not just about power or paranoia for it's own sake but about the terrible means humans will go to, and justify, in order to achieve something great.